Nebraska's Tom Osborne is the quintessential beautiful loser of college football; a perfect fall guy for somebody else's championship dreams. He is 1-7 against No. 1 teams since 1978. The Cornhuskers are 4-9 in their past 13 bowl appearances and have lost the past four by an average of 17.8 points.

The slide figures to dip to five on Wednesday night, when Osborne takes his team into the boisterous back yard of the Miami Hurricanes in the 58th Orange Bowl Classic.

Nebraska's presence is simply an afterthought during a week dominated by the tug-of-war for No. 1 between by Miami and Washington. The Cornhuskers are 10-point underdogs.

Despite a run of 11 consecutive New Year's Day bowls and an overall winning percentage of .812 (186-42-3) in 19 seasons at Nebraska, Osborne can't shake the dreaded asterisk of not winning a wire-service national championship.

''It's not unfair,'' Osborne said of growing dissatisfaction by fans in Lincoln, Neb. ''I've been at it a long time, 19 years now, and haven't brought the big trophy home. There are people in Nebraska who would like to see somebody else try it.

''Most people in Nebraska think Bobby Bowden is a great coach because he beat us the last two or three times we played, and they probably would settle for Bobby in a minute. Yet Bobby hasn't gotten it done with some pretty good players. There's a lot of things that have to conspire to get it.''

Osborne, 54, has been with the Nebraska program 30 years, beginning as a graduate assistant in 1962. Using a conservative offense that reflects his personality, Osborne thrives in a Neanderthal conference dominated by running teams. Nebraska has led the Big Eight in total offense and scoring nine times in 12 years.

Yet the Big Eight, known as the Big Two and Little Six until the recent emergence of Colorado, has never adequately prepared Nebraska to face pass-oriented demons from Miami or Florida State.

''Often, it's three downs and out when you pass,'' Osborne said. ''If you're going to play that style of football, you better have a superlative defense. Our style of offense takes a lot of pressure off the defense, because a lot of times we'll have the ball 12-14 straight plays while our defense rests.''

''We were tired of pointing fingers at each other,'' center Bill Ziegelbein said. ''We've been through a lot of these, quote, big losses, and it gets frustrating when we hear people saying you're overrated or your coach is bad. We know better than that.''

But without a national championship - that elusive highlight in Osborne's otherwise brilliant resume.

''People ask me that quite often,'' Osborne said of his failure to win it all, ''and they expect me to lie and say it doesn't mean anything to me. I would like to have done it, but it's not the overriding ambition of my life. . . . If you let it become a dominant passion, you might end up like Captain Ahab and drive yourself crazy.''